Let the Wookie Win / Girl Talk (The Master of Aggregates Society)

A note to all:

Guests, regular readers, today's post requires a bit of systems management. We're stepping out of our comfort zone and into the wonderful world of pop music. A little. For those of you who were directed here by forces beyond your understanding because you are interested in the new Girl Talk album (or because you subscribe to Roger Ebert's tweets (Thank you, Roger Ebert)), we invite you to stay, browse around. This is not a review. If that's what you're after, I will direct you here, and bid you good reading and good day, but there are, here (actually here), thoughts on the new Girl Talk album presented in a broader context, (that, I hope, rubs shoulders with public radio) so we hope you'll stick around for the conversation. For you, scholars, regular readers, I invite you also to click that little link. If you have reservations because it wasn't meant for you, here is your own link. It goes to the same place, but it's for you and as you're traveling you may experience the self-satisfaction to which you've become so accustomed. It's a good review, and as a preface to this post, it's a concise refresher of the method and history of Girl Talk. Enjoy, y'all. Shall we proceed?

C l i o ,    M u s e    o f    H i s t o r y    a n d    S o n g

"I ain't pass the bar, but I know a lil' bit"

Sometimes, scholars, the universe drops an idea into your lap. Usually, scholars, the universe does not then follow through by dropping permission to wax on about that idea on your public-radio-themed blog. On Monday morning, 15 November, I was not listening to my local affiliate.  As I drove to work (In my 2005 base-model Chrysler Sebring, complete with big, squishy steering-wheel cover), I was listening to the new Girl Talk romp All Day. For those of you who  have missed the event-itude surrounding this album drop, Mr. Girl Talk gave away (yes, for free) the tracks (or uni-track, if that's what you preferred) of his latest project here. He did so very, very early on that auspicious morning of 15 November. I suggest you go grab it if you haven't already.

Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story

The album kicks off with a mash-up of Black Sabbath and Ludacris. I imagine that most listeners did not then begin to experience bouts of excitement, fear, and resentment as they tried to figure out a scheme for writing about a matrix of near parallels involving Clio, Jay-Z, Homer, and Mr. Girl Talk (on their public-radio-themed blogs). For transparency's sake, I'll confess that I am imagining that scenario as we speak, and it's nice to see the lot of you so riled up over the oral poetry tradition and your public-radio-themed blogs. (May I link to your public-radio-themed blogs? And you to mine? (This may help with search engine traffic. (Everyone's a winner. (Thank you, Roger Ebert.))))


So, Black Sabbath and Ludacris, sure, why not, of course. Awesome, yes? Yes, awesome, and fun (though certainly not without it's internally critique-worthy elements as an album (again, for more on that I refer you to the links in the preface (you will not get a third link (whoops, you did)))), but who is the first voice on Mr. Girl Talk's latest opus? What are the first words breathed into our ears? "Hit me," says Mr. Jay-Z. "Hit me," indeed, scholars. Hit me. Indeed.


I won't drag out the connection here. Very simply, very naturally, and in a very scholastically insubstantial way, I thought, "Hey, you know . . . it's like Jay-Z is his muse or something."


We all know Mr. Girl Talk <3s Jay-Z. Duh. (If we didn't, now we do.) And then I thought something along the lines of, "that would make Mr. Girl Talk like a modern day oral poet, or something." Then I lit a cigarette, smoked it with my left hand, fed myself a piece of Turkish delight from the plastic container on the passenger seat with the other, and then Zeus (or Athena or one of those folks) drove my car while All Day shape-shifted. And then Chewbacca and I bumped the Millennium Falcon into hyperspace, and as the stars streamed by I thought,

"Wait, sir. You just wait. Stop the bus. I mean, okay. So it's like, yeah, he's invoking a muse, but what does this have anything to do with The Odyssey, really?"

(Wookie language in translation for ease of reading.)

"Well, Han," said Chewie, "I think you might actually be on to something here. Mr. Girl Talk is kind of an "artist" in the same way the Homer was "kind of" an artist."

"Go on . . ."

"Sure, I mean . . . Homer isn't taking credit for anything, right? The gods breathe into his lungs and he breathes out The Odyssey, amirite?"

"Right."

"And so Mr. Girl Talk––"

"––I think his name is Gregg Gillis."

"And so Mr. Girl Talk . . . Gregg Gillis . . . is just, you know . . . letting the party gods breathe in his lungs and then oops, All Day."

"I really miss Leia."

"Honestly, I don't want to hear about Leia anymore, Han. I thought this was "guy" time."

"Well, okay, so I get what you're saying. Black Sabbath, Katy Perry, M.I.A., The Doors,  Kid Cudi . . . These are all party gods? Or great heros? And Mr. Girl Talk is just sort of letting all this happen through him? Don't you think he wouldn't jump at the chance to brag about his agency? Say, "Hey! Me! See this giant matchstick I made out of all these little matchsticks? I did that!"And the muse . . . the muse is Jay-Z?"

"Jay-Z as the muse was your idea, I was just trying to fill in the gaps."

"I mean I guess I'm kind of buying it."

"Again, Han, you're the one selling it, really, I was just trying to be supportive."

"So what does all this say about anything?"

"Well I think Mr. Girl Talk's agency is kind of irrelevant. I think it's also not so troubling if you can't work out all the one-to-one correlations. The kind of neat thing here is that Mr. Girl Talk is aggregating. And there's some really old precedent for that."

"Like The Odyssey?"

"Seriously, Han, do you ever listen to yourself?"

"No, not really. Turkish delight?"

"I'm good, thanks. Seriously though, Han. You're being lazy. How can you extrapolate this? What exactly is it that you do?"

"I fight in the universe on the good side."

"Okay, Paul, Earth to Paul. What exactly is it that you do?"

Then, scholars, I realized that I wasn't in hyperspace. I was on Route 66 headed west. What exactly is it that I do? Well, I write a blog about public radio. Go on. Okay, well, um . . . I gather bits of information from here and there. Yes . . . I aggregate and analyze . . . Who else does that? Um . . . Jay-Z? No, he's the muse, you said that. (Actually, he does, in a way, but let's let him just be the muse for right now). Oh, right, ummm . . . Mr. Girl Talk? Yes! And who else? Me? Oh . . . me and . . . Homer? Sure, but who else? Umm . . . Don't be shy. . . . Um-um-um . . . Robert Siegel! Yes! And um . . . Ken Burns? TOTALLY KEN BURNS! So wait, like everybody? Well, maybe not everybody. But anyone in this topsy-turvy rickem'-rackem' world worth their salt. Anyone's who's trying to say anything in these fast times. So, wait, what does that say about agency? Motivation? Original artistic thoughts and what not? The signified and the signifier? Why are you bring semiotics into this? I just don't know anymore . . . It's okay to admit when you're wrong. Honestly, Italics, I don't think I ever really got much out of semiotics. If you had, you could probably bring this full circle to Logos or something else really impressive sounding. That's probably true. But most of all that stuff I learned in college has to compete with man-seeking ravens, and documentaries about baseball part two, and the universe, and divorce rates and China and the like. Well, listen, Paul. Sometimes, you have these ideas and it's important to try them out with a close friend. If you were smarter, or more driven, you'd have written a concise argumentative essay on the subject, done research, but if you were smarter, or more driven, there wouldn't have needed to be dialogue between Chewbacca and Han Solo, which, I daresay, is a first in academia. But what stone have we added to the temple of research? What was the point of all this? Sometimes it's just important to ask questions and draw correlations in a really naïve, childlike way, to get it all floating around in your brainy tissues and then let your dreams sort it all out. So we can blog about this on the public radio blog? Well, no. Why not? You didn't hear about it on public radio. 

Time passes. Friday 19 November, 2010:

Sometimes, scholars, the universe drops an idea into your lap. Usually, scholars, the universe does not then follow through by dropping permission to wax on about that idea on your public-radio-themed blog. Today, on All Things Considered (The Odyssey 2: Eclectic Boogaloo) a very nice man named Tom (sorry, Tom, I didn't catch your last name) reviewed the new Girl Talk album, All Day. I'm sorry, scholars, I did not pay close attention to the contents of that review. I had to see a wookie about an idea. 

Happy Divorce Village

"!+!=!"

All Things Considered, again, you blossom like a lotus flower. Today, a British woman (not Robert Siegel) reported on the recent phenomenon of increased divorce rate in China (send your Curriculum Vitae to China c/o China). The rate has doubled in the last decade; now, almost one in five (one in five!) Chinese marriages end in divorce (up from about one in ten (one in ten!)). (American divorce rate still lingering somewhere around 700% (USA#1!).

But here's where it gets interesting fascinating:

A correlation is being drawn between the rate increase and the blossoming of the single-child generation (the British lady, who is not Robert Siegel, informs us that this, in China, is referred to as the Post-Eighties generation (the Me, who is not a British lady, informs us that, in My Mind, they are really into grunge music and irony)).

China begins to enforce population control. One kid, citizens, just the one! And this, according to the British lady, went along just swimmingly until a nation of only children grew up and couldn't love each other. 

I love this story and I hate this story. I love this story because it makes so much sense. Think of the single children that you know and love (sorry, Carol, everyone's thinking of you (also, you're welcome, Carol, you self-involved nightmare)) and then imagine that China was populated solely by them (Carol(1,000,000,000)=China). Yikes!

I hate this story because I didn't predict it. I didn't say, "you know, scholars, one day China will be completely populated by spoiled little jerks (Carol, seriously though, we love you) that won't know how to compromise. There is nothing quite as lovely as welding the rebar of opinion, waiting a decade or so, watching as a news story comes along and pours the concrete, and then, one summer day, as you sit in your lawn chair and sip iced tea, you watch China cross your bridge one single-child at a time. 

Alas, I welded no such rebar. 

The good news, however, the British lady (not Robert Siegel) continues, is Happy Divorce Village. A gated community where––

Sorry, public radio. I did not have a "driveway moment" this time around. Sometimes I have to take the key out of the ignition and go to work.

I think, though, scholars, you'll agree that perhaps it's better this way. Happy Divorce Village. Period. How could it possibly be better than its name and all that its name implies?

Also, new GM stock, something, something. Remember the previous post? Neither. Do. I.

Prithee, Barry, How Now Shall We Know Thee?

/       ˘         /        ˘    ˘        /        ˘        ˘     /          / 

Pri-  thee,  Bar-  ry,  how  now  shall  we  know  thee?


Preface to the Post: 


Barry Bonds played some baseball. His head got much larger, but I do not feel the need to go into why his head got much larger. That's not my goal here. (Can you find the goal?) Ken Burns has made a new documentary that "documentarys" "the story of baseball" where his last "the story of baseball" left off, though I like to think of this sequel as primarily an editorial exercise for Ken. "Can I still garner recognition and pull America's heart strings with stock footage from the nineteen-eighties?"


Robert Siegel of All Things Considered recently interviewed Burns who pitched the film under the influence of a strong narrative. (Can you find the narrative?)


You: 


Paul, this is all so humbly straightforward and lacking in disconcerting repetition to a fault. And, hey, why aren't our sentences as grammatically symmetrical as yours? And what about 9/11? And we're not sure how accurately you scanned that pentameter. What's that sound?


Me:

"Cool Hat"

Barry Bonds played some baseball. You witnessed that. Or you didn't. In which case countless others and countless cameras did. But. Just in case none of those people or film footages happened to relay the Barry Bonds Experience in America to you directly, Ken Burns (director), with his upcoming documentary Baseball: The Tenth Inning (Which I can only assume is a followup to the remarkably unpopular The Black Irish Puzzle: Top O' the Nineteenth Century), would like to convey a few things to you about said Barry Bonds Experience in America.


Confucius say: When directly fails, call director.

Now let's assume that you've never heard of Baseball: The Tenth Inning, or Ken Burns (do you live in a cave or something?), or even baseball. Or maybe it's something other American vessels blip on the perimeter of your radar screen. It's a blip between deep-fried butter and maize art (neither of these (n'ese?) n'ese to be confused with deep fried art as your collection of deep fried art is under lock and key in the study next to your liberal arts degree that you display in a bell jar that you are polishing with your left hand as you scroll down this blog with your right. Ahem). It's out there, baseball is, somewhere.

Okay, we (us) have assumed these things on your (our) behalf. Now: 
WHO WILL TELL US WHAT KEN BURNS IS TRYING TO TELL US?

It's Robert Siegel of All Things Considered.

So, just to wrap up (we keep it tidy here): If you missed out on All Things Considered, and before that Ken Burns, and before that a decade or two of news and every human who might have happened upon that decade or two, and before that Barry Bonds, we (I (Paul)) have you covered:

Barry Bonds is complicated, please care. "Shakespearean."

The META Section, Page D6:


Obviously, I am going to watch this and have a genuine desire to  it's going to be awesome. Thank you, Robert Siegel, Ken Burns, and Barry Bonds. I am sure there is other information in Baseball: The Tenth Inning besides "Barry Bonds played baseball and it was way Shakespearean," but we all know why we're watching. And so does Robert Siegel, and so does Ken Burns. I just hope someone told Barry Bonds.


Also, the 9th Anniversary of 9/11 happened.